The adventures of Curtis: Day 14 – Holdingford, MN to Dalbo, Mn

Distance 70

Total Distance 795

Was kind of hard to get out of bed this morning. I must have been pretty tired. It was a beautiful morning. Had a light breeze out of the northeast which pretty much continued all day. Started the day riding the trail from Holdingford about 7 miles to Bolus and then it was back on the road.

One thing about riding here in Minnesota. It does seem like the scenery is pretty much the same thing day after day. Lakes, fields of crops, cattle and wet lands. I did see irrigation and pivots today; and potatoes. First time I saw those things.

Went through some pretty small towns today. Nothing too exciting. In fact, I just ate my lunch on the sidewalk of a gas station because there wasn’t anywhere else to get out of the sun. Just ate the PB&J and chips today. Pretty boring.

We are staying in Dalbo at the Adventure Cycling bunkhouse. It is this quite popular place for cyclists riding the Northern Tier Route to stop and spend the night. It started back in 2005 when a couple cyclists stopped and asked the farmer that lives here if they could spend the night on his lawn because there was nowhere else around to stay. He let them and called Adventure Cycling to let them know any cyclist could spend the night on his lawn whether they were here or not, so Adventure Cycling put the stop on their maps. Well in the time since, Donn Olsen has fixed one of his barns to be a bunkhouse for cyclists. It is really cool. Has a kitchen, showers, bathroom, place to watch TV & movies and bunks and cots for probably 30 people at a time. He says that in a season he has 200 to 300 people stay. He told me that because of the virus, this year has been pretty slow. He has his fridge stocked with drinks and candy and has food that can be prepared and has prices on the stuff, but cheaper than you can get them in the stores. Anyway, pretty cool. He asks you to use a camera and take a photo of yourself and then puts them up on the wall. I saw Dave (who was our tour leader when I went down the East Coast) and Kathy from when they took a tour around the US back in 2013.

It was a pretty normal day of riding. As I mentioned the wind blew from the northeast and I pretty much traveled East today, so had a little headwind. The good part is that it was 8 mph winds or so, so it wasn’t too bad. Tomorrow I will finish my trip. It seems that things have gone by pretty fast. I guess it was just a two week trip when I have taken much longer. I will just have to enjoy those last few miles!!